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I think we should stop procrastinating and file a class action lawsuit for the following grievences: harassment and violation of our constitutional rights as a government official, emotional abuse, child pornography, etc...

On the contrary, just about nobody tried bombing planes pre-9/11. If all we had done was fortify the cockpits so nobody could hijack anymore, most people that want to hurt Americans would go "well fuck planes are useless now"

instead, we decide their next logical step is blowing up the plane mid air, and make sure everybody knows it. Which of course begged people to get bombs onto the plane.

IMO we have done exactly two things since 9/11 that actually increase security on flights: (1) Reinforce the cockpit doors and (2) inform the flying public that in the event of a hijacking they have to fight back.

Exactly, I think that has been the best part of all of this. If someone is trying to hijack the plane, then assume you will die if you do nothing. Now simply having a weapon to instill fear with is useless.

What gets me is that they were using box cutters. And, apparently, they weren't laughed at. I'd have beaten the shit out of them, since they really aren't able to use numbers against you in a plane, and it's a goddamn box cutter, not a fucking knife for stabbing.

Heck, its only really useful in an ambush, or when you grab someone as a hostage. Of course, if you kill the hostage with it, then you have to hold 100+ lbs up while someone is going to still be keen on beating you.

That's the part that bugs me. Like, seriously. If these guys had real knives, I could see it. Or a gun. As is, this just is weird.

I'm not one of those Truthers, but I've always thought that aspect of the story had to be bullshit. Ten years later, I still cannot conceive of how they could have gotten away with that. One plane I could believe, but all four of them (minus one) overtaken by a bunch of dudes with box cutters? Please. There had to be something else going on that we don't know about.

What about this list of aircraft bombings? Admittedly, this list of bombings does include one incident on where the explosive * "consisted of a 15 gram firecracker designed to be lit manually."* I don't think that counts.

I meant few people bombed planes before 9/11, i didn't say they used bombs in 9/11. That was the point of my post actually, TSA was basically a reaction to 9/11, and it fights super hard to prevent bombs on planes, which weren't what caused it to be created. Basically i was saying, if they had put more emphasis on avoiding hijacking and less on avoiding explosives, the terrorists may well have put more emphasis on hijacking and less on explosives. This would be wonderful for us everyday passengers since, you know, a dangerous weapon that isn't an explosive or an acid or anything like that is usually hard, and with a defined shape, IE easy to find without groping folks.

as for the list, you'll notice except some big clumps in the 60's (what were those all about by the way? genuinely curious about that) they were relatively far apart. Compare that to the last 10 years, and it seems like every 9 months or so somebody's slipped a bomb onto a plane.

Thanks. I read a long time ago, back in 2003, I recall, that they failed a test miserably (50%) and since then the results of their tests haven't been released to the public.

I agree, they're a failure. It's theater at its worst.

Statistically speaking, if you're only 50% accurate and you've detected nothing and no planes have been destroyed, then there are no bombs being brought on planes through US airports. Not that bombs were at all at issue on 9/11.

The problem though is that the TSA/Government won't look at those figures and say "Hey, maybe we shouldn't even bother." They will just do even more to fuck citizens and travelers out of their rights and privacy.

This is funny to me because on 9/11, the passengers on board the flights were able to stop 1/4 attacks.

I thoroughly believe that now that people are aware of the risk, if anyone tries to hijack a plane in that manner again every man and boy old enough to fight would die trying to stop it, I bet passengers could stop 3/4 hijackings. Of course this doesn't apply if the plane isn't intended to be used as a missile, if they just want to blow it up mid air or something.

Edit: For those of you too young or who don't remember, the 1/4 that the passengers stopped on 9/11 was the plane that they crashed in a Pennsylvania field, rather than into the white house or capitol building.

Yeah well the FBI and CIA are employing people far superior in intelligence to the TSA. It's like putting the Green Bay Packers* up against a flag football team. Meaning seemingly any kid out of (or still in) high school can be a TSA agent.

Our champion chess team, and occasional flag football players beat our high school state championship football team. The reason the CIA and FBI can smuggle "weapons" past the TSA isn't because the CIA and FBI are more professional, it is because the TSA isn't really there to stop them (or terrorists) from doing that. The TSA is there to make people believe they are more secure.

What do you expect when you hire from a demographic that I would trust to prepare my food at Burger King, and then unionize them so they have almost no risk of losing their job short of getting a rape conviction.

Imagine how long it would take and how invasive it would be to catch every little thing. There is a limit to the amount of stuff they can catch using an ambiguous x-ray machine, metal detector, and ball touchings.

Unfortunately the lesson that seems to be taken away from this is that clearly the organization is needed (sad that this is a constant value), and since they're not very good they need more money! And more power!

Over the past 10 years they have succeeded in bringing weapons on board plains around 75% of the time they tried.

I can attest to this. I fly about once a month for work and I've accidentally carried my Leatherman Skeletool on at least 2/3rds of the flights without even realizing it (because I always carry it). In the last 10 flights, they've only caught my swiss army pen, which had less than a 1" blade and I got out of line to mail it home.

If I can get a knife/tool on a plane by accident, I can only imagine how easy it is to get one on intentionally.

It's security theater. They want everyone to know they spend a shit load of money on security and ensure that security people in uniforms are always very visible to deter people from trying anything crazy. The problem is that the people that are most dangerous are not in any way deterred by this charade. This makes the TSA immediately far less effective in reality while still increasing their presence and invasive searches for show.

I'm certainly no fan of the TSA, don't get me wrong, but this isn't really a hugely fair shake. There is no way to track how many people haven't gone forth with whatever crazy ideas they may have due to the risk of getting caught. I've never received a speeding ticket, but seeing a cop sure makes me slow the fuck down.

That's not to say, by any means, that it's worth $8.1 billion, but let's at least paint a complete picture.

From a non-American's perspective, I think that's more the goal of the TSA than anything - to deter people from flying by using these crazy invasive methods so people think "fuck this, it isn't worth it. I'll just find another way to get to my destination".

Decreasing the number of flyers would theoretically decrease the number of aero-victims (not the ones in the buildings that the planes crash into) and also theoretically increase the concentration of terrorists in the flying group so the TSA would have an easier time weeding them out.

I think it's more about an organization expanding as much as the government will allow it rather than about keeping people off of planes. TSA is one of those organizations that are difficult to cut funding to when the boogeyman of national security is introduced. It's the same reason our defense spending is through the roof.

How many planes were hijacked between 1993 and 2001 in the US? What, none? That it hasn't happened since 2001 is indicative of jack shit on their ability to prevent anything any more than metal detectors do already.

I doubt anyone here would advocate an absense of security measures in airports. But most TSA violations of privacy, as well as all the new measures they've been introducing, are justified using the logic that they are going to stop attacks or at least provide greater security, something which, more and more apparently, is not happening.

Smarter, less invasive, and demonstrably more effective security, I think, would receive widespread support. And though I'm no security expert, I'm willing to bet such security would involve much less defacing of the constitution as well.

Oh, most certainly. I remember reading some profiling about the Israeli (I think?) transportation security that is well trained in psychological profiling and most of what they do is barely noticeable but highly effective. Would much prefer that than being herded around and felt up by some goon making $12/hour.

As I understand it the Israeli system, while good, deals with far fewer passengers than a country like the US. It would be impossible to apply the same system to our volume. Honestly I don't know what makes a good security system, but I do know that under pre-9/11 measures there wasn't a terrorist attack a week. Times may have changed but there is no reason to think security as we have it today is by any means vital. Honestly a good chunk of the solution might ultimately be taking steps as a society to make sure we're not quite so hated by some groups of people.

What if we were to separate the pilots from the passengers completely? Meaning no door at all to the cockpit besides the one from outside.

Sure a terrorist could blow up an airplane still but how is that any different from the terrorist blowing up a bus/bridge/building or gunning people down in the park or anything which could potentially be easier and less suicidal?

If we just want a deterrent, then why don't we go back to pre-9/11 security screenings? Why can't you bring on a bottle of water or thermos of coffee?

The "enhanced" security is supposed to find things or it's the definition of fighting the last war. If they're out to find the next underwear or shoe bomber, they're out of luck. It's been done before. Who would try it again? The next guy will have condoms of CD4 and a wireless transmitter in his rectum. Will the solution be to have cavity searches of every passenger?

A reasonable passenger screening process would ask four questions: Where are you going? Why? What will you be doing there? Where are you staying?

With a couple potential follow-up questions to make sure the story holds together.

It could be done to every passenger at the gate prior to boarding the plane or when you drop your checked baggage off.

But...doing this requires thought, which is far too expensive and rare in America.

What is funny is the checkpoint are a huge Target in and off themselves. Hundreds of people, densley packed together, lots of witnesses and still an aviation target. I'm waiting for the checkpointbto enter the line to go through the checkpoint.

Oh indeed, we've had to go through airport checks and I've thought "Hang on, we've got our two children with us; is there a precedent for terrorists bringing their whole family with them?" - but the point of these checks isn't to guarantee catching any and everything; it's really to serve as a deterrent.

However, it's the same as drink driving; you can chance doing it, and may well get away with it - but that doesn't mean we dismantle the system because it's not 100% effective.

I like your idea of the four questions, however if they really tried to implement that then someone would probably make it into a personal rights issue.

The point is that they have an organizational problem. They say, "We will detect all hazardous materials and we'll test ourselves." So they send in a false team to test the screeners. And the screeners are failing to live up to the standard. And in all the years we've had the TSA, they've been ineffective at meeting the goals they were chartered to meet. Moreover, they're proving that those goals are unnecessary because even while not meeting them, there haven't been any terrorist attacks.